FRANCE: The chorus of criticism and pique has grown steadily louder in France since the President of the EU Commission, Mr José Manuel Barroso, announced the portfolios for his team a week ago. Lara Marlowe in Paris reports
French politicians claim the "minor" transport portfolio given to President Jacques Chirac's nominee, Mr Jacques Barrot, shows a waning of French influence in Europe. The most oft-heard explanations are that France is alien to the liberal economic ideology espoused by Mr Barroso and that he wanted to reward countries which supported the US invasion of Iraq.
"Mr Barroso is showing that he is the champion of hard and fast liberalism," former European Affairs Minister and current socialist MEP, Mr Pierre Moscovici, told Le Monde. "He gave all the key posts to \ liberals and he wanted to thank the countries which joined alongside him in the Iraqi affair and participated with him in the Azores summit."
It is only a small jump from such statements to portraying Mr Barroso as Washington's catspaw. According to Le Canard enchaîné, analysts at the French Foreign Ministry believe Mr Barroso's appointments were cleared by the Americans.
There is speculation that Mr Peter Mandelson, the British commissioner for trade, may revive the idea of a transatlantic free trade zone, which was fought by the outgoing French commissioner Mr Pascal Lamy.
The opposition socialists add another explanation for France's declining influence: the alleged "arrogance" of Mr Chirac. "For treating his partners high-handedly, for humiliating them . . . for treating the Commission in a cavalier manner, Jacques Chirac has been punished," Mr Moscovici said. When Mr Moscovici was in office from 1997 until 2002, France's German partners made similar comments about him.
Mr François Bayrou, the leader of the centre-right UDF party, said Mr Barrot's appointment was "a humiliation without precedent for French diplomacy".
The UDF is France's most pro-European party, but Mr Bayrou seemed to forget the principle of equality between big and small, old and new members. "France was treated worse than Lithuania, whose commissioner will supervise financial programming and the budget," he complained.
Mr Chirac is widely criticised for choosing Mr Barrot, a friend and close political ally who has served as minister of trade, health and social affairs, and as UMP president in the Assembly.
Mr Barrot has virtually no European experience and speaks no language other than French. Had Mr Chirac chosen a "heavyweight", critics speculate, France might have obtained a more important position.
Mr Barrot had hoped to obtain the competition or internal markets portfolio - the latter given to Mr Charlie McCreevy. To add insult to injury, his position is much reduced compared to responsibilities given to the Spanish transport commissioner Ms Loyola de Palacio in the Prodi Commission; she was also in charge of energy and relations with the European Parliament.
Ms Nicole Fontaine, former president of the European Parliament who is now an MEP for Mr Chirac's UMP party, said it was unfair to criticise Mr Barrot for not speaking English at a time when France was fighting to increase the use of French in European forums. She attributed the loss of French influence in the EU to the "disastrous" Treaty of Nice, concluded under the last French presidency, France's refusal to respect Community regulations and its slowness in applying European directives.
It is also suggested that France and Germany received less important posts because their poor economic performance hurt their credibility.